so the weekend following my wonderful birthday, we traveled to the normandy region of france with joanie, eric, and all 3 kids. normandy is about 2.5 hours west of paris, and it's known for it's wonderful apples, and also for being the site of one of the most famous battles in all of human kind: the storming of the normandy beaches by the allied forces (US, england, france, and kinda canada) during WWII. this was incredibly fascinating. we visited a couple museums, walked through some bunkers the nazis used to fend off the invasion, and also visited the US cemetery. the cemetery was unimaginably beautiful. it was right on the coast and bigger than i expected. many many headstones, and the little museum beside it was only 2 years old, but it was full of a lot of very interesting, tragic, and informative history. we stayed at a very nice hotel, which joanie and eric were nice enough to put us up in.

after going back to paris, and spending another day cruising around paris, we went to the westin hotel to spend my last night in the "civilized" world before i started my arduous journey to africa. the lovely barthel family gave me a wonderful going away present: a night's stay in a high class hotel before i left. colin and i made the most of it by bringing two bottles of wine each, bagettes and cheese and some movies to watch. room service was a little expensive (10 euro for a glass of milk), so we waited til late night and ordered some ice cream in bed. it was a wonderful evening, i'm glad that i was able to spend my last night in a classy hotel with my boyfriend. it was just the kind of relaxation i needed before my hectic adventures that awaited me in africa. thank you barthels, i love you all.

leaving the next day was hard, but i gathered up a little bit of strength, rubbed my stone, and caught the bus to the airport. Africa here I come!!!!!!